The Phoenix Coyotes have not done well against the Chicago Blackhawks in the past, but tonight, figured out that if they jumped on them early they could make good things happen. Less than 3 minutes into the first period. Martin Hanzal took a pass from Ed Jovanovski into the zone and did just a simple deke which Cristobal Huet bit on and put it right past him for an easy goal. Later in the period Peter Mueller would finally break out of his season long slump getting his first goal. Shane Doan passed the puck to Martin Hanzal in front of the net. Huet made a pad save on his deflection, but Peter Mueller was there to bat it home to extend the lead to 2.
Midway through the 3rd Scottie Upshall would make it 3-0 on a sick wrister that Huet could make the move to get to. David Schlemko, just up from San Antonio made a perfect cross ice pass to set him up an Huet wasn't even close. Though just minutes later the Blackhawks took advantage of a terrible Power Play sequense by the Coyotes to get a shorthanded goal. Not Bryz's finest moment of the night, but with all the other insane saves he made I'm not going to sweat the one goal much.
Other Notes:
- Ed Jovanovski appears to have twisted or sprained an ankle. That's not good considering we're down Sauer and Michalek already. No word on the severity of the injury yet but hopefully it's not bad as Michalek is apparently walking around with a cast on his leg and Sauer is still a little ways from coming back.
- Seeing Peter Mueller finally get that monkey off his back was great. Hopefully it gets him going as we could use the offensive output.
- Our PK was pretty solid tonight, not allowing and PP goals on 6 tries. THe guys did a good job of limiting the time in the zone and protected the blueline very well, frustrating the Chicago PP guys.
- On the flipside, our power play has look awful. We can't get in the zone and set for any amount of time. There was a minute here or there where we looked alright, but getting the shortie on us was unacceptable.
- Ilya Bryzgalov was solid again. I really don't know what to say about him anmore. With the exception of an off night here or there he's really gotten this team to where it is.
- David Schlemko looked pretty good out there, eating ice time and getting an assist.
- Daniel Winnik has looked as good as I can remember him being. Hitting guys, blocking shots, digging for pucks and leading the team in +/- with a +5
- Martin Hanzal is a beast. If you don't believe me, watch him shutdown your teams' superstars when we play you. Then you'll see. Solid again.